Business Leased Line Costs 2026: The Complete UK Guide
How much does a business leased line cost in the UK? We break down pricing by speed, location, and contract term — covering all the major carriers including BT, Virgin Media, CityFibre, Colt, and Vorboss.
Quick Cost Overview
Leased line pricing varies significantly based on bandwidth, location, contract length, and installation complexity. Entry-level 100Mbps leased lines suit small to medium businesses with 10–20 employees. Installation costs typically range from £500–£2,000 for standard deployments, though many providers waive installation fees on 36-month contracts. Rural locations or sites requiring extensive civil engineering may incur excess construction charges (ECCs). The only way to know your exact price is to check your postcode — pricing varies street-by-street.
Jump to full pricing tableBusiness Leased Line Price Guide — 2026
Monthly rental prices for fully managed, symmetric leased lines. Prices shown are indicative for on-net locations. Installation fees typically £500–£2,000+ (waived on 36–60 month contracts). Carriers: BT and Virgin Media offer nationwide pricing (often higher); CityFibre, Vorboss, and independent carriers offer competitive regional pricing.
| Speed | London | Major Cities | Suburban | Rural |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 100 Mbps | £69–£234Best value | £69–£318 | £69–£320 | £69–£320+ |
| 500 Mbps | £250–£380 | £320–£450 | £380–£500 | £400–£550+ |
| 1 GbpsMost popular | £129–£450 | £129–£500 | £129–£500 | £129–£650 |
| 10 Gbps | £349–£850 | £349–£950 | £349–£950 | £349–£1,200+ |
What Affects Your Leased Line Cost?
Understanding these cost drivers helps you budget accurately and identify opportunities for savings.
Location and Distance
Your distance from the nearest network exchange point significantly impacts costs. Central London locations with existing fibre infrastructure typically see lower installation costs and monthly fees. Rural businesses or sites far from exchange points may face excess construction charges (ECCs) ranging from £500–£10,000+ for civil engineering works.
Contract Length
Standard leased line contracts run 36 months. Longer commitments (36–60 months) often include waived installation fees and reduced monthly costs. Shorter contracts (12–24 months) typically carry higher monthly fees and full installation charges.
Installation Complexity
Standard installations where fibre reaches your building incur minimal costs. Complex scenarios — requiring road excavation, wayleave agreements with landlords, or routing through multiple properties — add significant expenses through ECCs (surveyed upfront, no surprises).
SLA Requirements
Premium SLAs guaranteeing 99.95%–99.995% uptime, 4-hour fix times, and enhanced support cost 10–15% more than standard 99.99% tier. Financial services, healthcare, and organisations with regulatory requirements often select premium SLAs despite higher costs.
Provider and Network
BT and Virgin Media offer nationwide coverage at consistent (often higher) pricing. Alternative providers like CityFibre, Vorboss, and independent carriers offer competitive pricing in their coverage areas, particularly in major cities. AMVIA compares 15+ suppliers to secure the best pricing.
Support Level
Leased lines include 24/7 UK-based support with priority engineer response. Premium SLAs guarantee responses within 1 hour and on-site engineer attendance within 2–4 hours. Standard SLAs typically commit to 2-hour responses with 4–6 hour fix targets.
Why there is no fixed price for a leased line
Two businesses on the same street can get quotes hundreds of pounds apart for the same speed. That is not a pricing trick — it reflects what a leased line actually is: a dedicated fibre circuit built to your premises. The quote depends on which carriers already have fibre near you, how far your building sits from their network, and how much civil engineering is needed to close the gap. Nationwide carriers price conservatively everywhere; regional networks price aggressively where they have already built. The only way to know your real price is a live availability check against your postcode, which is why the checker on this page beats any generic price table.
Why cost per Mbps falls as speed rises
The counter-intuitive rule of leased line pricing: ten times the bandwidth never costs ten times the price. A 100Mbps circuit starts from £69/month while 1Gbps starts from £129/month — roughly double the money for ten times the capacity. The reason is that most of the cost is the physical circuit, the install and the ongoing management, not the bandwidth running over it. Once the fibre is in, lighting it at a higher speed is cheap. This is why businesses that expect to grow usually skip the 100Mbps tier: the step up to 1Gbps costs far less than a second procurement in two years.
What moves a quote up or down
Four factors do most of the work. Distance to fibre: if a carrier is already in your building or the duct outside, the circuit is cheap to deliver; if not, the connection charge grows with every metre of new dig. Excess construction charges (ECCs): where civil works are needed — crossing a road, new ducting — carriers pass on the cost, and it only surfaces after a site survey, which is why quotes sometimes change after survey. Contract term: carriers routinely waive installation on 36–60 month terms and price the monthly rental lower; a 12-month term pays full install and a premium rental. Carrier choice: the cheapest quote at your postcode is usually a regional network you have not heard of rather than the national incumbent — which is why comparing one carrier’s price list tells you very little.
Installation charges, and how to compare them honestly
Installation typically runs £500–£2,000 where infrastructure exists, and is frequently waived on longer terms. When comparing quotes, always compare the total contract cost — monthly rental times term, plus install, plus any ECC exposure — not the headline monthly figure. A quote with a low rental and a heavy install can cost more over three years than a higher rental with install waived. Check what the price includes: a managed router, a static IP block and a meaningful SLA with service credits should be in the price, not extras.
Are leased line prices still falling?
Over the past decade UK leased line prices have dropped substantially — the result of altnet fibre build-out creating real carrier competition at postcodes that used to have one option. The trend continues but is flattening: in well-served urban areas prices are near the floor, while rural pricing still carries a premium because the infrastructure gap is real. If your last quote is more than two years old, it is stale — re-check availability before renewing, because a network may have built past your door since.
Leased line or full-fibre broadband?
FTTP broadband has closed the speed gap on paper — gigabit download for a fraction of the price. What it does not close is the upload (a fraction of download, versus symmetrical on a leased line), the contention (shared bandwidth, versus dedicated), and above all the SLA: a leased line fault carries a contractual fix time with credits behind it, while broadband is best-efforts. The honest test is what an outage costs you per hour. If the answer is “not much”, business fibre broadband is the rational buy; if downtime stops trading, the leased line premium is insurance correctly priced. The full comparison is on our leased lines guide.
Frequently Asked Questions
100Mbps leased lines typically cost £69–£234 per month in London, £69–£318 in major cities like Manchester and Birmingham, and £69–£320+ in rural areas. Installation costs range from £500–£2,000 for standard deployments, though many providers waive these on 36-month contracts.
1Gbps connections represent the sweet spot for many growing businesses — offering 10x the bandwidth of 100Mbps for roughly 2x the cost. Urban areas typically cost £129–£450/month, suburban areas £129–£500/month, and rural areas £129–£650/month.
Ultra-high-speed 10Gbps connections serve large enterprises, data centres, and media companies. Urban areas offer the most competitive pricing at £349–£850/month, suburban areas £349–£950/month, and rural areas £349–£1,200+/month. London businesses benefit from specialised providers like Vorboss offering disruptive pricing.
ECCs are additional costs for civil engineering works needed to bring fibre to your premises. Rural installations may incur £500–£10,000+ for trenching, duct installation, or road excavation. These are surveyed upfront so there are no surprises. Many providers waive ECCs on longer contract terms (60 months).
Yes — many providers waive installation fees on 36-month contracts in areas with existing fibre infrastructure. Longer terms (60 months) may also include ECC waivers and installation fee reductions. AMVIA negotiates the best terms across all carriers.
London businesses benefit from market-leading competition with dense fibre coverage from multiple carriers including BT, Virgin Media, Colt, CityFibre, and Vorboss. This ensures lower ongoing costs and often reduced or waived installation fees for standard urban deployments.
Typical installation requires 45–90 working days from order to activation. Urban locations with existing fibre infrastructure may complete in 30–45 days. The process involves a site survey (weeks 1–2), wayleave permissions (weeks 2–6), civil engineering (weeks 4–10), and go-live testing (weeks 10–12).
The initial quote assumes standard delivery. The survey establishes what the build actually requires — duct condition, wayleaves, any civil works — and excess construction charges are added where the assumptions don’t hold. Quotes at postcodes with existing on-net fibre rarely move; quotes needing new dig can. Always ask whether a quote is pre- or post-survey when comparing providers.
Yes — most effectively at renewal and by using the term. Carriers price 36–60 month contracts materially below 12-month terms and usually waive installation. At renewal, a fresh availability check is your leverage: networks that have built into your area since your last contract will price to win the circuit, and your incumbent will usually match rather than lose it.
It should — a static IP allocation is standard on a business leased line, along with a managed router and an SLA with service credits. If any of those appear as paid extras on a quote, that is a signal to compare further. Confirm what is bundled before signing rather than after.
It depends on what an hour of downtime costs you, not on headcount. A small firm that trades through cloud systems, takes payments online or runs its phones over the internet can lose more in one outage than the annual premium over broadband. A small office that mainly browses and emails is usually better served by full-fibre broadband with a 4G/5G backup.
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